Popular – for a reason.
Back in the day when Harry Potter first came out, I was a nay saying sceptic. I poo poo’d anyone who read the book and dismissed it as popularist tripe. And then I read it. And loved it. Since then I’ve encouraged all I know to read it, bought copies for people and even watched two stage musical adaptions of it performed by school kids on youtube (don’t knock it till you’ve tried it – it’s awesome http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OepW-AG-Ris&feature=fvst ).
Point is that I’m often more inclinded to distance myself from something popular initially based on it being popular rather than its actual merits. Perhaps it comes from my penchance for Triple J, which is anything but commercial. Or my desire to be different and unique and like a dazzling star flying across the nights sky…..among all the other stars in the universe.
Regardless, I often do come to realise the beauty of things that are popular and I am not ashamed to sing their praises once I do. My latest is the iPhone. My, what a tool – and I’m not refering to the people that use them as I originally would have. Now days I go everywhere with it, finding my way on the go, booking places, contacting people, taking photos – it’s a veritable swiss army knife with a fifth dimension. Also I can talk to it and it will call people for me – this doesn’t save any time or is really that useful – but I feel sooooo cool doing it. Perhaps I’m being a bit narrow minded when I say this, but I feel like as a modern man, I breath, iPhone. Cavemen used rocks, the modern man uses an iPhone. I’m not going overboard here I think, it’s not like I have a name for the thing and take it to bed with me tucked up in a little iSleepingBag – it’s just an inordinately useful tool – and I really like that and it deserves to be popular.
There’s a reason why there are always crowds at the Eiffel tower.
p.s Here’s a list of other popular things that I am quite partial too.
- The song ‘someone I used to know’ by Gotye
- Lady Gaga
- The new Kia Optima
- Krispy Kreme Donuts
- The sound of a Commodore V8
- The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown
- The film Notting Hill
You can quote me on this.
In probably one of the greatest poems ever written ‘If’, Rudyard Kipling writes about the value of being able to talk with Kings without losing the common touch. I take this to mean people of all social standings, economic levels, cultures, genders, sexual preferences, classes, intellect, education, preference of beverage, girth, shampoo choice etc. And recently I’ve been made aware of the value in this.
Whilst living overseas I was able to meet people of all types – from people who had a white grand piano in their two story apartment to people who lived meal to meal. My latest move to Melbourne has been an extension of this exploration and I’ve shared valuable time with a range of people. In doing this I try to adapt and forge myself to fit their mould somewhat, which despite sounding soulless is a necessity to a degree. In different social networks people operate under different norms, codes and rules. Doing one thing in one sub-culture can be interpreted completely different in another. For example gently nudging someone towards a pile of horse manure on the footpath could be seen as a cheeky joyful blag in one culture but a bit on the nose in another.
Yet by quoting another awesome chap from history, I’d like to point out to myself if no one else that it is important not to forget who you actually are. Ghandi said something along the lines of ‘I will open my doors and windows to the winds of all cultures but I won’t let any blow me off my feet’. Recently I have been having trouble with some of the social mores of a certain social group and I was trying harder and harder to fit myself right – struggling with the realisation that I wasn’t quite getting it. I then had a skype chat with one of my mates whose now living in France and the differences between him and my pals here was dramatic. It got me realising that it is important to understand the rules and expectations of a cultural group, but you don’t have to let them own you. It is handy to have enough social capital to engage with people from different groups, but you don’t have to emulate it to learn from it.
If social groups, cultures, sub-cultures and societies were a smorgasbord of food it would be a shame to gorge yourself only at the one plate – that’s a Justin special.
